BRUSSELS — EU countries on Monday signed off on sweeping new plans to reform how the bloc deals with migration. The measures, approved at a meeting of EU justice and home affairs ministers in Brussels, will give capitals the power to remove people who don’t have the right to live and work in the bloc, to set up asylum processing centers overseas and to create removals hubs outside their borders. It comes amid growing public unrest over migration, in a move designed to counter the far right and overhaul the way capitals deal with new arrivals. “We are at a turning point of the European migration and asylum reform,” European Commissioner for Migration Magnus Brunner told POLITICO’s Brussels Playbook. “These are all measures that will help process claims more effectively and reduce pressure on asylum systems. And they all send the same signal: Europe will not tolerate any abuse of its systems.” The draft legislation includes a new “solidarity pool” in which countries — apart from those already facing high levels of migratory pressure — will be asked to resettle migrants or pay for other countries to support them. In addition, a new list of “safe countries” has been drawn up, from which asylum applications will be rapidly rejected unless there are extenuating circumstances. Additional rules, still to be agreed by ministers on Monday, would mean countries are able to set up asylum processing centers in non-EU countries, as well as “return hubs” from where people whose claims are unsuccessful can be removed. The changes have been pushed by Denmark, which holds the six-month rotating presidency of the Council of the EU, with the country’s center-left government setting out a hard-nosed approach to irregular migration both at home and in Brussels. “We have a very high influx of irregular migrants, and our European countries are under pressure,” said Danish Minister for Immigration and Integration Rasmus Stoklund. “Thousands are drowning in the Mediterranean Sea or are abused along the migratory routes, while human smugglers earn fortunes.” “This shows that the current system creates unhealthy incentive structures and a strong pull-factor, which are hard to break.” There had been dissent from countries such as Spain, which worry the new rules go too far, and Slovakia, which claimed they don’t go far enough. Despite that, negotiators managed to strike a deal before the legislative agenda grinds to a halt during the winter break. “To get the migration challenge under control has been a key demand from European leaders for years. For many, this is perceived as paramount to keep the trust of European citizens,” said one European diplomat, granted anonymity to speak frankly. Migration is high on the list of public priorities and has been capitalized on by right-wing parties in elections from France to Poland in recent years. In her State of the Union address in September, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said tackling irregular migration was key to maintaining the perception “that democracy provides solutions to people’s legitimate concerns.” “The people of Europe have proven their willingness to help those fleeing war and persecution. However, frustration grows when they feel our rules are being disregarded,” von der Leyen said. The EU has also come under fire from U.S. President Donald Trump in recent days, whose administration claimed in an explosive new strategy document that Brussels’ migration policies “are transforming the continent and creating strife.”

Wies De Graeve is the executive director of Amnesty International Belgium’s Flemish branch. Tomorrow, Seán Binder will stand trial before the Mytilene Court of Appeals in Lesvos, Greece for his work as a volunteer rescuer, helping those in distress and at risk of drowning at sea. Alongside 23 other defendants, he faces criminal charges including membership in a criminal organization, money laundering and smuggling, with the risk of up to 20 years in prison if convicted. I first met Seán in 2019. A bright, articulate Irish activist in his twenties, he was our guest at the Belgian launch of Amnesty International’s annual end-of-year campaign. And there, he shared his equally inspiring yet shocking story of blatant injustice, as he and others were being prosecuted for saving lives. Two years earlier, Seán had traveled to Lesvos as a volunteer, joining a local search-and-rescue NGO to patrol the coastline for small boats in distress and provide first aid to those crossing from Turkey to Greece. Since 2015, the war in Syria has forced countless individuals to flee their homes and seek safety in Europe via dangerous routes — including the perilous journey across the Aegean Sea. In 2017 alone, more than 3,000 people were reported dead or missing while attempting to cross the Mediterranean, and when authorities failed to step in, many volunteers from across Europe did so instead. Seán was one of them. He did what any of us would hope to do in his position: save lives and help people. Yet, in 2018, he was arrested by Greek authorities and held in pretrial detention for over 100 days before being charged with a range of crimes alongside other humanitarian workers. These charges aim to portray those who help people on the move as criminals. And it’s part of a trend sweeping across Europe that’s criminalizing solidarity. In Malta, three teenagers from West Africa stand accused of helping to bring more than 100 people rescued at sea to safety, and are facing charges that carry a lifelong sentence. In Italy, ships operated by search-and-rescue organizations are being impounded. And in France, mountain guides have faced prosecution for assisting people at the border with Italy. European governments are not only failing people seeking protection, they’re also punishing those who try to fill that dangerous gap. I met Seán again in 2021 and 2023, both times outside the courthouse in Mytilene on Lesvos. In 2023, the lesser misdemeanor charges against him and the other foreign defendants — forgery, espionage and the unlawful use of radio frequencies — were dropped. Then, in 2024, the rest of the defendants were acquitted of those same charges. While leaving the courthouse that day, still facing the more serious felony charges along with the other 23 aid workers, Seán said: “We want justice. Today, there has been less injustice, but no justice.” As Amnesty International, we’ve been consistently calling for these charges to be dropped. The U.N. and many human rights organizations have also expressed serious concerns about the case, while thousands across Europe and around the world have stood by Seán’s side in defense of solidarity with migrants and refugees, signing petitions and writing letters. This trial should set off alarms not only for Europe’s civil society but for any person’s ability to act according to their conscience. It isn’t just Seán who is on trial here, it’s solidarity itself. The criminalization of people showing compassion for those compelled to leave their homes because of war, violence or other hardships must stop. This trial should set off alarms not only for Europe’s civil society but for any person’s ability to act according to their conscience. | Manolis Lagoutaris/AFP via Getty Images Meanwhile, a full decade after Syrians fleeing war began arriving on Europe’s shores in search of safety and protection, Europe’s leaders need to reflect. They need to learn from people like Seán instead of prosecuting them. And instead of focusing on deterrence, they need to ensure the word “asylum,” from the Greek “asylon,” still means a place of refuge or sanctuary for those seeking safety in our region. People who save lives should be supported, not criminalized. This week, six years after our first encounter, Seán and I will once again meet in front of the Mytilene courthouse as his trial resumes. I will be there in solidarity, representing the thousands who have been demanding that these charges be dropped. I hope, with all my heart, to see him finally receive the justice he is entitled to. Humanity must win.

BRUSSELS — On the same day world leaders arrived at the COP30 summit in Brazil to push for more action on climate change, Greece announced it will start drilling for fossil fuels in the Mediterranean Sea — with U.S. help. Under the deal, America’s biggest oil company, ExxonMobil, will explore for natural gas in waters northwest of the picturesque island of Corfu, alongside Greece’s Energean and HELLENiQ ENERGY. It’s the first time in more than four decades that Greece has opened its waters for gas exploration — and the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump is claiming it as a victory in its push to derail climate action and boost the global dominance of the U.S. fossil fuel industry. It comes three weeks after the U.S. successfully halted a global deal to put a carbon tax on shipping, with the support of Greece. “There is no energy transition, there is just energy addition,” said U.S. Interior Secretary and energy czar Doug Burgum, who was present at the signing ceremony in Athens on Thursday, alongside U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright and the new U.S. Ambassador to Greece Kimberly Guilfoyle. “Greece is taking its own natural resources, and we are working all together toward energy abundance,” Burgum added, describing Greece’s Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis as a leader who “bucks the trend.” Only a few hours later, U.N. secretary-general Antonio Guterrez made an impassioned plea for countries to stop exploring for coal, oil and gas. “I’ve consistently advocated against more coal plants and fossil fuel exploration and expansion,” he said at a COP30 leaders’ summit in Belém, Brazil. Donald Trump was not among the many world leaders present. NOT LISTENING “America is back and drilling in the Ionian Sea,” said Guilfoyle, the U.S. ambassador, at the Athens ceremony. Drilling for natural gas — a fossil fuel that is a major contributor to global warming — is expected to start late next year, or early 2027. Greece’s Minister of Environment and Energy, Stavros Papastavrou, hailed the agreement as a “historic signing” that ends a 40-year hiatus in exploration. Last month, Greece and Cyprus — both major maritime countries — were the only two EU countries that voted to halt action for a year on a historic effort to tax climate pollution from shipping. Greece claimed its decision had nothing to do with U.S. pressure, which several people familiar with the situation said included threats to negotiators. Thursday’s ceremony took place on the sidelines of the sixth Partnership for Transatlantic Energy Cooperation (P-TEC) conference, organized in Athens by the U.S. and Greek governments, along with the Atlantic Council. Greece aims to showcase its importance as an entry point for American liquefied natural gas (LNG), bolstering Europe’s independence from Russian gas. LNG from Greece’s Revithoussa terminal is set to reach Ukraine this winter through the newly activated “Vertical Corridor,” an energy route linking Greece, Bulgaria, Romania and Moldova.

The EU wants students from the bloc’s southern neighbors to join its Erasmus exchange program, it announced Thursday as part of a broader plan to bolster Europe’s presence in the Mediterranean region. The inclusion of non-EU students from countries in Africa and the Middle East is part of the “Pact for the Mediterranean”, which also includes a proposal to double the EU’s budget for this region to €42 billion. The bloc’s Mediterranean partners include Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Palestine, Syria and Tunisia. European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen outlined the three sections of the pact in a statement: People, economy, and the link between security, preparedness and migration. EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas told journalists the pact includes more than 100 projects, ranging from support for 5G networks and improved mobile connectivity in the region, to youth-focused programs and “rail, road, maritime links to subsea cables carrying data between our nations.” The EU’s Commissioner for the Mediterranean Dubravka Šuica said the pact aims to “connect young people” and broaden the Erasmus Plus and Horizon Europe programs, calling it the “Mediterranean University.” The pact would also help universities in the region develop joint degrees and programs with their counterparts in the EU. “We will also scale up talent partnerships with Morocco, with Tunisia and with Egypt, and facilitate issuance of visas in particular for students” from these countries, Šuica said. On migration, Šuica called it the “greatest shared challenge” and a “shared opportunity” for the two sides. She said the pact will support efforts to prevent illegal departures and fight smugglers in the EU’s southern neighbors, while creating legal pathways “to address Europe’s labor needs.” “Our deeper cooperation is a strategic choice, and it is reflected in the creation of [the] new DG MENA [the Directorate-General for the Middle East, North Africa and the Gulf] and also in the … Commission’s proposal to double the budget for this region to €42 billion in the next programming period,” Šuica said. “We have so much to offer to those countries in terms of equal partnership. We are interested in the cooperation regarding energy, connectivity, critical raw materials,” Kallas added. “Our proposal is much more positive than that of the other geopolitical players, but we really need to work on that,” Kallas added, referring to competition from China and Russia in the region. Von der Leyen described the Mediterranean as a “bridge between continents for people, for goods, for ideas.” “The truth is that Europe and the Mediterranean cannot exist without each other,” she added.

Mounir Satouri is a Member of the European Parliament and the Green chair of the Subcommittee on Human Rights. It is now over a month since the EU-backed Libyan Coast Guard (LCG) opened fire without warning on the rescue ship Ocean Viking in international waters, risking the lives of 34 humanitarian workers and 87 shipwreck survivors. This attack was conducted from a boat transferred to the LCG from Italy under an EU-funded program. But the bloc’s regulations are clear: The European Commission cannot fund parties involved in human rights abuses. And the European Ombudsman has already accused the Commission of maladministration over its refusal to release the impact assessments of its Libya program. Yet, despite all this — and an attempted homicide complaint lodged in the Italian courts — EU cooperation with and funding for the LCG continues unabated. The level of malpractice is going unnoticed because these events are solely being viewed through the lens of Europe’s ongoing migration crisis. Indeed, it is a moral stain on Europe that its border control strategy involves funding militias that kidnap people on the high seas and return them to places where, according to bodies like the U.N., they are tortured, raped, enslaved and sometimes killed. But it would be a mistake to view this solely as a migration issue. The central Mediterranean is among the busiest shipping lanes and is crucial to the world’s economies. And Europe cannot be taken seriously as a legitimate security actor while it funds anarchic militias operating in destructive ways close to its shores. It’s not just refugees and NGOs, Italian fishing boats have been attacked by LCG crews too. The contagion of impunity in the Mediterranean was also visible in the repeated drone attacks on flotilla vessels in international waters that were bound for Gaza. Mercifully, Spanish and Italian naval intervention provided some disincentive for such attacks. But it should never have been allowed to reach that point. Of course, Italy’s shift in posture was too late for the Ocean Viking crew, who requested NATO assistance after the shooting but received no support. But in the future, could European countries find themselves in the absurd position of providing military escorts or medical evacuations for their citizens under attack from forces that were funded by their own taxes? Faced with a civil society backlash from 42 humanitarian and legal organizations after the Ocean Viking attack, the Commission defended its continued funding of the LCG, saying it needed to “remain engaged to improve things” — an argument that would have held more water were it not for 10 years of unchanged behavior by the LCG and extensively documented violence. In a grim irony, another Italy-provided LCG boat shot at another rescue ship just two days after the Commission’s statement. The way to constrain an out-of-control actor isn’t to reward and enable their behavior. And from a policy standpoint, Europe’s approach is incoherent on several levels: It’s been widely documented (including as recently as last month) that Libyan government-associated militias play a double-game to profit off the crisis in the Mediterranean, and are involved in both border enforcement as well as smuggling and trafficking. The floating crime scene of the Ocean Viking now sits in an Italian harbor, signaling the further breakdown of rule of law in the Mediterranean. | Francesca Ruta/EPA In the context of states cutting development aid, what remains must be spent wisely, helping deliver stability — not the opposite. And yet, Europe-backed militias have used their maritime assets in internal Libyan conflicts, and experts now fear that EU support has enabled conflicting parties to disregard the peace process and strengthen militia control over Libyan public institutions. Such cynical foreign policy sparks backlash. The region is watching the EU’s transactional approach in Libya and beyond, with the head of Libya’s Presidential Council implicitly criticizing the bloc’s approach at the U.N. this month. Plus, after two years of inaction and incoherence on what a U.N. commission has now termed a genocide in Gaza, European diplomacy can ill-afford further accusations of hypocrisy and neocolonialism from the global south. Policy shaped by short-term migration headlines ultimately risks handing influence and power to Europe’s geopolitical rivals. Moreover, the Commission’s attempt to appease Europe’s right over migration hasn’t worked — instead, it has sacrificed rules, transparency, morality and security. And perforated by bullet holes, the floating crime scene of the Ocean Viking now sits in an Italian harbor, signaling the further breakdown of rule of law in the Mediterranean. However, this could also be the cold water shock the Commission needs to abandon a decade of failed strategy. As it draws up a new Pact for the Mediterranean, the Commission could make sure to include a commitment to stop financing Libyan security forces, and urge Italy and others to do the same. It could also include commitments to humanitarian action, to help EU member countries coordinate competent search and rescue operations, to open routes for people fleeing Libya to seek safety and justice, and to ensure European financing supports rather than endangers — whether at home, in Libya or at sea.

[1] https://digitalreport.protectedplanet.net/ [2] Satellite sea surface temperature measurements began in 1982; ocean heat content estimates are derived from in situ observations that started in 1960. [3] https://marine.copernicus.eu/osr9-summary/flipbook/ [4] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/28/world/europe/spain-beach-blue-dragon-sea-slugs.html#:~:text=The%20arrival%20of%20the%20tiny,what%20they’re%20dealing%20with. [5] https://marine.copernicus.eu/osr9-summary/flipbook/ [6] https://marine.copernicus.eu/osr9-summary/flipbook/

Don’t focus so much on Ukraine that you miss the severe threats to European security brewing in Libya. That’s the message Italy and Greece are trying to deliver to their EU and NATO allies, but without much success. Migrant flows from Libya are spiking again, at a time Rome is increasingly concerned about Russia’s growing influence in the unstable North African nation, wielded through arms supplies and a potential new naval base in the northeastern port of Tobruk. Athens has also sent two warships to conduct patrols off Libya in response to the migration surge and its strategic concerns that its archrival, Turkey, is working with the Libyans to carve up the Mediterranean into maritime zones for energy exploration. The zones claim waters just south of the Greek island of Crete, while Athens deems them illegal under international maritime law. Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani has described Libya as “an emergency that Europe must address together,” but a European attempt to make some diplomatic headway last week degenerated into farce. EU Migration Commissioner Magnus Brunner, accompanied by ministers from Italy, Greece and Malta, was declared “persona non grata” in Benghazi, the territory of the eastern Libyan strongman Khalifa Haftar. Accused of unspecified “violations,” the delegation was ordered to leave. “Russia’s role in Libya continues to expand, using it as the central node in its African strategy,” warned one EU diplomat who follows the dossier closely. The diplomat added that a politically connected smuggling network in Libya was supporting Russia’s strategic efforts, helping Moscow to circumvent sanctions and to weaponize migration. Italy and Greece know, however, that tackling a problem as complex as Libya — a country more than three times the size of Spain — will require support from big allies such as the U.S. and France. So far, however, the response from those allies has been underwhelming.    MIGRATION AGAIN TOPS THE AGENDA The Greek government announced tough new migration rules on Wednesday as it struggles to cope with a surge in arrivals from Libya on Crete at the height of the tourist season. “An emergency situation requires emergency measures and therefore the Greek government has taken the decision to inform the European Commission that … it is proceeding to suspend the processing of asylum applications, initially for three months, for those arriving in Greece from North Africa by sea,” Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis told lawmakers. Some 9,000 people have arrived in Crete from Libya since the start of the year, most of them in recent weeks, already almost double the number for the whole of 2024. Some 9,000 people have arrived in Crete from Libya since the start of the year, most of them in recent weeks, already almost double the number for the whole of 2024. | Yannis Kolesidis/EPA In late June Greece deployed two warships in a bid to curb the recent surge of migrant arrivals. Senior government officials doubted their effectiveness, however, warning that naval patrols may encourage migrants to pitch themselves into the water to seek rescue. Sure enough, in the last week alone over 2,000 migrants came ashore in Crete. The Greek government is also taking criticism from both the opposition and its own officials for having abandoned the Libya file in recent years. Overall there has been a 7 percent rise in irregular crossings in the central Mediterranean in the first part of the year, almost entirely from Libya, compared to an overall 20 percent drop on all the other main routes. The Greek crackdown has also triggered fears in Italy that more migrants will be pushed into Italian waters. “We are concerned about the situation in Libya and the recent increase in irregular departures,” a European Commission spokesperson said before last week’s EU visit to the country. Being concerned is one thing, finding a solution quite another. Diplomats described last week’s diplomatic mission as an attempt to determine what solutions could be feasible. EU cash, after all, would likely play some role. The EU struck a highly controversial deal with Tunisia in 2023 in which it paid the authorities to stem migrations, but diplomats doubt such a model could be replicated in a country as destabilized by rival militias as Libya. RUSSIANS AT THE GATE A recent display of Russian weapons in Benghazi during a military parade showed the Kremlin’s growing proximity to Haftar.   Russia wants a stronghold in the Mediterranean, especially after the new authorities in Syria terminated Moscow’s lease at the Port of Tartus after the fall of Bashar al-Assad. Italy’s Tajani issues regular warnings that Libya is the most likely destination for a replacement naval base. According to a report by the Agenzia Nova news agency, Moscow also wants to install missile systems at a military base in Sebha in southern Libya, which is controlled by Haftar, and to point the rockets at Europe.  Many analysts and diplomats are skeptical that Moscow is already at the stage of pointing rockets at Europe from Libya. But even without the missiles, Russia can already use a handful of military bases in Libya for logistics, “which theoretically could hit Europe,” said Arturo Varvelli, a senior policy fellow for the European Council on Foreign Relations. So far, Russia has mainly used Libyan bases to run its operations in the rest of Africa, operating mainly through the Africa Corps, backed by Russia’s defense ministry. The Greek government announced tough new migration rules on Wednesday as it struggles to cope with a surge in arrivals from Libya on Crete at the height of the tourist season. | Yannis Kolesidis/EPA There are also growing fears among southern European officials that Russia could soon be able to harness migration from Libya in a rerun of the hybrid war it launched on the EU’s eastern front, when it forced Middle Eastern refugees over the Belarusian border into Poland. Still, not everything is going Russia’s way. One of the diplomats said the costs of the war in Ukraine were depriving the Africa Corps of the funding it needed to pay Libyan militias, creating tensions with its proxies and Haftar. “I don’t see the Russians taking over” the migrant smuggling business, said Karim Mezran, a resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, but “I see the Russians telling the people: Now I’m the new ruler and you just follow my orders.”  A QUEST FOR ALLIES Despite the gravity of these threats from Libya, Italy and Greece are struggling to convince their allies to step up. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni discussed Libya with French President Emmanuel Macron at a three-hour meeting in Rome on June 4. Libya “is of course a topic of key relevance for both Italy and France,” said an Italian official with direct knowledge of the talks between Paris and Rome, stressing “common concerns, especially on security — as regards also Russia’s increasing presence there — and migration.” The Italian official, however, acknowledged that there are “nuances” between the two countries’ positions “on the possible political solutions.” Libya is increasingly being added to the agenda of more diplomatic talking shops, but in practical terms little is happening. While Italy desperately wants buy-in from military heavyweight France, the subject simply isn’t as vital to Paris as it is to Rome, and even exposes France’s recent failures in Mali and Niger. “For Italy, the question of Libya is more central in the short term than for France,” said Virginie Collombier, a professor at Luiss University in Rome and an expert on Libya. “Politically, the French government has little interest in crying wolf on Russia because it highlights the failures of the French government,” she said, noting that France has gradually withdrawn from African countries in the Sahel region while Russia has upped its presence. And with the U.S. increasingly looking to the Pacific, there is scant hope that Washington will invest much political capital in stabilizing the country. Most tellingly, the most recent NATO declaration, signed June 25 in The Hague, doesn’t even mention Africa. “No one wanted divisive issues [included] as NATO now has a very minimalist agenda,” said Alessandro Marrone, head of the defense, security and space program at the Rome-based Istituto Affari Internazionali think tank.  That’s a bitter pill for the Italians. Rome has “now to face this reality,” Marrone added. Laura Kayali contributed reporting.

BRUSSELS — Climate change supercharged last week’s European heat wave and tripled the death toll, a group of scientists said Wednesday.  Extreme temperatures baked large swaths of the continent in late June and early July, exposing millions of Europeans to dangerous levels of heat.  Looking at 12 European cities, the researchers found that in 11 of them, heat waves of the type that peaked last week would have been significantly less intense — between 2 to 4 degrees Celsius cooler — in a world without man-made global warming.  This climate-induced change in temperatures, the scientists said, led to a surge in excess deaths in those cities. Of the 2,300 additional fatalities linked to high temperatures, around 1,500 of them can be attributed to global warming, they estimated.  “Climate change is an absolute game changer when it comes to extreme heat,” said Friederike Otto, a climate scientist at Imperial College London, which co-led the research.  A construction worker in Italy and a street cleaner in Spain were among those thought to have died of heat stroke last week. But most heat-related deaths, particularly among the elderly, go unreported. The scientists said the vast majority of deaths they analyzed occurred among Europeans aged 65 or older.  As a result, heat is often dubbed a “silent killer,” though it’s no less deadly than other climate-related disasters. The scientists noted that last week’s heat wave killed more people than devastating flood events in recent years, which resulted in several hundred deaths.  “Our study is only a snapshot of the true death toll linked to climate change-driven temperatures across Europe, which may have reached into the tens of thousands,” said Garyfallos Konstantinoudis, also a climate specialist at Imperial College London. Global warming, driven by burning fossil fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas, is increasing the severity and frequency of heat waves in Europe and worldwide. An aging population also makes Europe more vulnerable to the health effects of extreme temperatures.  The European Environment Agency has warned that heat-related deaths are expected to increase tenfold if the planet warms 1.5 C, and thirtyfold at 3 C. The planet is already 1.3 C hotter than in preindustrial times and on track to warm 2.7 C this century.  THE TOLL OF EXTREME HEAT The rapid analysis published Wednesday — which uses methods considered scientifically reliable but has not undergone peer review  — was led by researchers at Imperial College London and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.  The scientists looked at deaths in Milan (where they estimated 317 fatalities were due to changes in the climate), Barcelona (286), Paris (235), London (171), Rome (164), Madrid (108), Athens (96), Budapest (47), Zagreb (31), Frankfurt (21), Lisbon (also 21) and the Sardinian city of Sassari (six) between June 23 and July 2.  “These numbers represent real people that have lost their lives in the last days due to the extreme heat. Two-thirds of these would not have died were it not for climate change,” said Otto.  Last week’s heat also drove up wildfire risk across Europe, with fires still raging in many parts of the continent. The analysis does not include deaths linked to fire or smoke. In Spain, for example, two farmers were killed trying to flee encroaching flames last week.  The Spanish government separately monitors heat-related excess deaths and found that between June 21 and July 2, more than 450 people died due to extreme temperatures — 73 percent more than in the same period in 2022, which saw record numbers of deaths.  WESTERN EUROPE’S HOTTEST JUNE The EU’s Copernicus climate monitoring service, meanwhile, said Wednesday morning that last month was the third-hottest June on record worldwide.  For Europe, it was the fifth-warmest June, though the western part of the continent saw its hottest June on record, the scientists said — just above the 2003 record, which was followed by a summer marked by deadly heat.  The temperatures in Europe are further amplified by what Copernicus terms an “exceptional” marine heat wave in the Mediterranean Sea. The water surface temperatures have hit their highest level on record, not just for June but for any month.  “June 2025 saw an exceptional heat wave impact large parts of western Europe, with much of the region experiencing very strong heat stress. This heatwave was made more intense by record sea surface temperatures in the western Mediterranean,” said Samantha Burgess, strategic climate lead at the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts.  “In a warming world, heat waves are likely to become more frequent, more intense and impact more people across Europe,” she added.  Cory Bennett contributed to this report.